On 2008-10021, Mark wrote: > Hm that's funny, I thought that *er-clocking was a hardware thing. > Normally, processor speed is statically set by the BIOS on system > startup, and cannot be changed while running. This is why overclockers > have to set a jumper and change their multiplier on startup.
You're right. What I meant to write was "something comparable to under/overclocking" but done in software. > However, modern processors have the AMD something speed and the Intel > speedstep thing that allows an OS to send a BIOS call via ACPI that > changes the processor speed live. The ranges of speeds usable are > predefined by the processor, and this is what is used by acpid or > other daemon that changes processor speeds. Well, my problem is I don't have much experience running Linux on an Intel processor. So I don't know which of AMD and Intel has a wider CPU frequency change range. I just concluded that they have more or less similar ranges. My two AMD systems (AMD X2 2.5Ghz and Sempron 1.8Ghz) have a similar lowest frequency setting of 1000mhz, while my Core 2 Duo laptop downclocks to 800mhz. On the other hand, I read a howto by a FreeBSD user on the BSD version of cpufreq. It shows a 2.8Ghz Pentium 4 with a lowest frequency setting of 350MHz: http://www.klintrup.dk/soren/cpufreq/ So I had to conclude that the FBSD kernel has a better speed control mechanism. _________________________________________________ Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List http://lists.linux.org.ph/mailman/listinfo/plug Searchable Archives: http://archives.free.net.ph
